Mondsee culture

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The Mondsee culture is an archaeological culture of the late Neolithic age that dates from around 3800 to 3300 BC. Existed in the Salzkammergut and adjacent areas.

The sites at Mondsee and Attersee have been part of the cross-border UNESCO World Heritage Site of Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps since 2011 .

Research history

The discovery of the Mondsee culture is thanks to the archaeologist Matthäus Much . In the years 1870 to 1872 this brought to light the remains of prehistoric pile dwellings in the Mondsee . When these sites were uncovered, Much found rich remains of material culture. In cooperation with Moriz Hoernes , the settlements and the finds were dated to the regional Late Neolithic and Eneolithic . Investigations of the pottery and copper finds gave rise to this . The discoveries were not published until 1927 by Leonhard Franz and Josef Weninger . The prehistorian Paul Reinecke was convinced that the Mondsee culture should be placed in connection with the Altheim group , since both groups fit into the late Neolithic culture. This was supported by the Viennese prehistoric Richard Pittioni . He noticed a relationship to elements of the funnel cup culture, which in turn led him to assume that both groups developed out of this.

This was opposed by the opinion of Jürgen Driehaus , who in 1960 assigned the Altheim Group to the cultural complex of his “Northern Alpine District” in the Young Neolithic . The Mondsee culture, on the other hand, is not one of them and is younger than the Altheim group, which would result in an end-Neolithic era. Only the beginnings overlap with the end of Altheim in the Young Neolithic. Driehaus u. a. in the Furchstich and Kerberi ceramics of the Salzburger Land. His hypothetical dating later found favor with the German prehistorian Hermann Müller-Karpe . It was Kurt Willvonseder who set himself the task between 1963 and 1968 to record and organize the entire Mondsee culture in all of the material available to him. Based on R. Pittioni, he made his distinction based on the copper finds. He divided them into four different groups of forms, which extended periodically, from the Eneolithic to the Urnfield Culture. With him, the Mondsee culture in Upper Austria developed out of the Münchshöfen culture and shows the influences of the Moravian-Lower Austrian funnel cup culture . The decorating technique of the ceramic furrow stitch came in a later phase, together with the first metal imports from the eastern areas in the Salzkammergut region.

The more recent research is based on the research of P. Reineckes and R. Pittionis. She assigns the Mondsee culture to a time in the Young Neolithic and sees a close connection to the Altheim group. The replacement of the Mondsee culture by other ceramic forms is indicated by the Misling  II station on the Attersee, the typical end-Neolithic vessels connected with a corresponding 14 C date around 3000 BC. Has.

Material culture

One of the leading forms of Mondsee ceramics is the decorated and undecorated mug with a handle. This often has a pear-like shape and a long ribbon-shaped handle. Sometimes the latter is drawn up over the edge of the mouth of the vessel. In addition to the jug, cups and barrel-shaped or double-conical handle mugs are typical of the ceramics of the Mondsee culture. What is characteristic, however, are not the vessel shapes. The so-called Mondsee type is characterized by the manner in which the decoration is applied and its elements. There are smoothed, hard to moderately well-fired clay remains. Based on this, the vessels were gray to black in color. The white ornamental patterns of the vessels are now conspicuous in the late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age periods. The decorations were stabbed deep to fill them with lime incrustation . It is a mixture of crystalline carbonate of lime (calcite), white mountain chalk from the nearby Mitterweißbach chalk quarries and slaked lime. In order to ensure the cohesion of this mixture, burnt bone ash was used as a binding agent. This finding is based on research by the archaeologist Matthäus Much . In the incrustations, circumferential bands of lines with hanging or standing triangles (partly hatched) and rounded stamps often formed the neck pattern of the objects. There are also rows of dots and concentric circles with or without radial lines. A so-called sun pattern was used in the abdominal area. Occasionally this was also found decorated with hatched triangles. Furthermore, volutes made of ladder tape and linear ceramic bow hooks and garlands are documented. In addition to these patterns, a well-known motif from the Lengyel culture of nested angle hooks adorned the vessels.

Stone jewelry includes stone beads and stone disks with a conical top and V-shaped perforation on the bottom (2 to 5 cm in diameter). The stone beads have different shapes and sizes (2 to 10 mm). There are olive-shaped, double-conical, cylindrical, oval and disc-shaped. Raw material and semi-finished products can also be found in the found material. The raw material consists of rock crystal, rubble, graphite, red chalk and fossil coal. Stone tools are knocking, grinding and cooking stones, net countersinks and friction plates.

The copper and bronze inventories of the Mondsee culture were rich in finds. Among other things, a large number of enamel shells, casting molds and casting drops were found, which suggests an activity in the manufacture of metal tools. The most important finds include flat axes of the Altheim and Vinca types. In addition, handle plate daggers, awls (with a square cross-section), small spiral rosettes and also small knife blades were found. The latter have a convex cutting edge. Research assumes that the Mondsee culture is related to the copper mining in the east of the Alps. This hypothesis is supported by a metallurgical investigation of the flat axes. Their arsenic content points to the copper mining area of ​​the Mitterberg near the Salzkammergut lakes. However, it is not fully clear whether the Mondsee culture was involved in the mining. An underground activity has not yet been proven.

Dating

Calibrated radiocarbon dates date the Moon Sea culture from about 3770 BC. Until 2260 ± 90 BC Chr.

The reason for the abrupt end is not yet known. In 2008, the German geoarchaeologist Alexander Binsteiner discovered evidence of a prehistoric landslide on Schafberg near Lake Mondsee . This landslide, the pouring of which separates Mondsee and Attersee today (course of the Seeache ), could have wiped out the culture in an inland tsunami . Due to an estimated 50–100 million cubic meters of block debris, the lake level of the Mondsee is likely to have risen by two to four meters.

For about a millennium, the shores of the Mondsee and Attersee lakes were probably uninhabited. Only from the Early Bronze Age there are a few pile dwellings again, which suggests hesitant repopulation. The Abtsdorf station excavated by Elisabeth Ruttkay in 1977 and the Attersee group derived from it should be mentioned here. Based on the ceramics, a classification in the Early Bronze Age levels A2 / B1 according to Reinecke is possible.

distribution

The Mondsee group was widespread in the Eastern Alpine region. The Mondsee and Attersee lakes in Upper Austria's Salzkammergut form the core area. In 1871, the archaeologist Matthäus Much found around 20 wetland settlements (so-called pile dwellings) on the banks of the lakes  , which were supplemented by later land finds, both in Upper and western Lower Austria and the Salzburg district. The settlement of the Upper Bavarian Auhögl near Hammerau is in dispute. The Neolithic settlement is part of a cultural area that is made up of the Mondsee and neighboring Altheimer groups. The location is treated differently depending on the literature.

Locations

Locations of pile dwellings and other types of finds:

See am Mondsee, Litzlberg Süd and Abtsdorf III are part of the UNESCO World Heritage (and Abtsdorf I, which is dated 1500–1000 in the Bronze Age)

literature

  • Alexander Binsteiner , Erwin M. Ruprechtsberger: Mondsee culture and analysis of the Silexartifacts from lake on Mondsee . In: Linzer Arch. Forsch. Sonderheft 35. Linz 2006, p. 1-88 .
  • Mondsee Group. In: Joachim Preuß (Ed.): The Neolithic in Central Europe. Cultures - Economy - Environment. From the 6th to the 3rd millennium BC, an overview of the state of research. Beier & Beran, Weissbach, Volume 2, Part C Overview of Cultures 1998, pp. 75-78; u. Volume 1–2, Part B: Overviews of the status and problems of archaeological research 1998 pp. 344–350 (2nd edition 2008, volume 3 overview of cultures, maps, including 1998 in a slipcase, 2008 CD-ROM).
  • Elisabeth Ruttkay: Typology and chronology of the Mondsee group . In: The Mondseeland. History and Culture . Linz 1981, p. 269-294 .

Web links

Commons : Mondseekultur  - collection of images, videos and audio files
  • Stilt houses . Tourist association Ferienregion Attersee - Salzkammergut (with illustration of the reconstruction in Heimathaus Schörfling)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Joachim Preuss (Ed.): The Neolithic in Central Europe. Cultures - Economy - Environment. Part B: Overviews of the status and problems of archaeological research. 1998, pp. 344-350.
  2. ^ Fritz Sauter, Kurt Rosmanith: Chemical investigation of incrustations in Mondsee ceramics . In: Archaeologia Austriaca . H. 40. Vienna 1967, p. 1–5 (concerns the objects from Mondsee, Station See).
  3. ↑ Illustration in: History of the Ceramists. (No longer available online.) In: Homepage of the Viennese ceramists. National guild of independent stoners, tile and tile layers and ceramics companies in Vienna, archived from the original on December 22, 2007 ; Retrieved October 24, 2007 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.kachelofen.or.at
  4. ↑ a b c Maximilian O. Baldia: Mondsee C14 Dates. (No longer available online.) Comp-archaeology.org, 2001, archived from the original on December 11, 2007 ; accessed on October 24, 2007 (English).
  5. ↑ Scharfling / Mondsee (VRI-311): C14 dating 4940 ± 120 BP; Baldia Mondsee C14 Dates 2001
  6. ↑ Mondseekultur 4940–4310 BP Tab. 1 14 -C Dates of the Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age in Austria . In: Herwig Friesinger, Walter Kutschera, Peter Stadler, Eva Wild: Absolute Chronology for Early Civilizations in Austria and Central Europe using 14 C Dating with Accelerator Mass Spectrometry ( Homepage ). Project, QAM Quantitative Methods in Archeology, 14 C Theory and Practice , on winserion.org.
  7. ↑ Alexander Binsteiner: Natural disaster in the Alps. The fall of the Mondsee culture. Archeology online, December 17, 2010, accessed November 10, 2018.
  8. ↑ MondSeeLand: Was Ötzi on a stopover in Mondseeland? (No longer available online.) In: im-salzkammergut.at → Mondseeland. April 20, 2010, archived from the original on April 23, 2010 ; accessed on November 8, 2010 (with numerous illustrations). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.im-salzkammergut.at
  9. ^ Matthias Schulz: Pompeii of the Stone Age . In: Der Spiegel . No. 41 , 2008, p. 160-162 ( online ).
  10. ↑ a b Eva Lenneis , Christine Neugebauer-Maresch , Elisabeth Ruttkay : New Stone Age in Eastern Austria . In: Research reports on the original and Early History (=  Scientific Series Lower Austria . No. 102/103/104/105 ). No. 17 . Lower Austrian Press House u. Verlagsgesellschaft, St. Pölten / Vienna 1995, Tab. 1 The u C data on the Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age in Austria , p. 210-224 , p. 10 ( univie.ac.at [PDF]).
  11. ↑ a b c Elisabeth Ruttkay: archaeological finds from the stations Abtsdorf I, II and Abtsdorf Weyregg I . In: Bundesdenkmalamt (Ed.): Find reports from Austria . No. 21, 1982 . Vienna 1983, ISBN 3-85028-127-2 , p. 19-24 ( BDA ).
  12. ↑ Scharfling's wooden object
  13. ↑ Feuchtbodenensiedlung is a listed building